City of Vaughan

Key highlights

• Vaughan is home to 113 unique foreign languages, an increase of eight languages from the 105 reported languages in 2016
• The most predominant foreign languages understood by Vaughan residents include, in order of most to least understood, Italian, Russian, Mandarin and Hebrew and Spanish.
• 85,960 Vaughan residents use a non-official language most often at home this represents 27 per cent of Vaughan’s population.
• 6 million Canadians spoke a language other than English or French at home representing 13 per cent of Canada’s population.

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INSIGHTS and Findings

Canada and Ontario

English and French continue to be the most commonly spoken languages in Canada. Nine out of ten Canadians speak one of the two official languages on a regular basis at home. However, the country’s linguistic diversity is continuing to grow with 4.6 million Canadians speaking a language other than English or French at home representing 13 per cent of our population. When considering all languages 59 per cent of Canadians can converse in one language, 32 per cent are bilingual, 8 per cent trilingual, and 1.5 per cent can converse in four or more languages. Since 2016 a decline was seen in the number of Canadians who spoke predominantly European languages such as Italian, Polish and Greek while Canadians who spoke a South Asian language such as Gujarati, Punjabi, Hindi, or Malayalam grew significantly since 2016. Mandarin and Punjabi remain the two languages other than English and French spoken most often at home.

City of Vaughan

Vaughan continues to be a multicultural community. By “knowledge of language” there are 113 unique languages spoken within the city in 2021, an increase of eight languages since 2016. The most predominant foreign languages understood by Vaughan residents are included below.

1. Italian – 48,885
2. Russian – 24,160
3. Mandarin – 17,645
4. Hebrew – 14,065
5. Spanish – 12,675

By languages spoken most often at home 85,960 Vaughan residents indicated they spoke a language other than English or French. When compared nationally 27 per cent of Vaughan’s population speak a non-official language spoken most at home compared to only 13 per cent of the country’s population that speaks a non-official language at home. The top five non-official languages spoken most often at home are included below.

1. Russian – 12,650
2. Italian – 10,920
3. Mandarin – 10,115
4. Cantonese – 4,705
5. Spanish  – 4,330

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2021 CENSUS RELEASE SCHEDULE

Statistics Canada will release 2021 Census topics throughout 2022. Economic Development will continue to monitor and provide Council with information on Vaughan’s growing demographics and economy.

• 21, 2022 – Indigenous peoples and housing
• 26, 2022 – Immigration, place of birth, and citizenship; ethnocultural and religious diversity; mobility and migration
• 30, 2022 – Education, labour, the language of work, commuting, and instruction in the official minority language